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West Bengal
By Marcus Dam
That the KLO — an extremist outfit demanding a separate Kamtapur homeland carved out of some areas of north Bengal — is in league with the ULFA of Assam and is jointly running training camps in the hills of Bhutan have also been endorsed by various Intelligence agencies. The militants were killed in an encounter with the police and the CRPF in the dense forests of the Buxa Tiger Reserve in Jalpaiguri district in north Bengal. Two AK-56s were found in their possession. Over the past five months, there have been a series of incidents in which the KLO, the ULFA and Bodo extremists have either been shot dead or arrested in raids conducted by the security forces in the region. The existence of these training camps had been brought to the notice of the Bhutan Government following repeated requests by the West Bengal Government to the Centre to take up the matter with the authorities concerned in Thimpu. "The district administration here was informed that the issue would be taken up at the Bhutan National Assembly, the Bhutan Government having vowed that military operations would start against the militants if persuasion to leave the country failed. But so far we have not been able to notice any action by Thimpu against the militants," the Superintendent of Police, Jalpaiguri, S.N. Gupta, told The Hindu. "The militants continue to move about at will even though they appear to have changed their route into West Bengal from the clandestine arms training camps that continue to exist in the Bhutan forests." The KLO was formed in 1993 and its militants, many of whom are trained in the use of sophisticated arms by ULFA activists in the Bhutan camps, have been operating in the tribal-dominated areas of Jalpaiguri district in the vicinity of the 150-km border it shares with Bhutan. "Their activities, which include assassination of rival political leaders, kidnapping of businessmen and extortion of money from employees and officers in the far-flung tea gardens, spans the Buxa Duar, Maynaguri and Dhupguri areas of the district," Mr. Gupta said. The district Intelligence has a list of 166 persons identified as hardcore KLO militants, 13 of whom have been killed in encounters, he added. Ever since the KLO stepped up its activities, the State Government has strengthened the deployment of forces from the State Armed Police in the region. These forces have been supplemented by additional companies of the CRPF. Only last month, two companies of the Special Security Bureau have been inducted to step up vigilance. Another two companies are expected to be posted there soon.
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